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We've improved Slashdot's video section; now you can view our video interviews, product close-ups and site visits with all the usual Slashdot options to comment, share, etc. No more walled garden! It's a work in progress -- we hope you'll check it out (Learn more about the recent updates).

The state has a sunshine law. They used the sunshine law. They shared the results.

I don't see what is potentially damaging about people knowing you signed it anyway. It doesn't make you a gay-bashing red-necked evil conservative. In fact, it could simply mean that you prefer a direct vote to a vote of representatives.

Just going by number of people, a legal drug will probably always be a greater ruin of lives nationally simply because of much wider availability - alcohol and tobacco in the USA.
However, as grandparent suggested, cocaine is probably a lot higher than alcohol on the rate of "users who ruined their lives with it vs total users".

Sunday Scientist writes "Minnesota researchers have created a beating heart in the laboratory. In a process called whole organ decellularization, they grew functioning heart tissue by using dead rat and pig hearts as a sort of flesh matrix, and reseeding them with a mixture of live cells. The goal is to grow replacement parts, using their own stem cells, for people born with defective tickers or experiencing heart failure."

Kevin Spiritus lets us know that XiTi Monitor, a French Web survey institute, has published its browser barometer for July, and Internet Explorer continues to lose ground. "The ascension of Firefox continues... Nearly 28% average use rate in Europe in the beginning of July 2007, with a progression in the totality of the 32 European countries studied. Firefox doesn't loose ground in any of the countries."

Tomorrow is Mother's Day in the US, and Newsweek's N'Gai Croal rightly estimates that many gamers owe a lot to their mothers. Because they indulged what they likely initially saw as a strange choice of hobby, we have a thriving gaming industry to enjoy today. The Level Up site offers an interview with a woman on the Newsweek staff who learned to tolerate those 'console things', and another piece where N'Gai interviews his own mom about his games-related past. "N'Gai: Growing up, you allowed us kids to have a computer, but we weren't allowed to have a videogame machine. What was your thinking behind that? Yvonne Croal: Well, in my estimation at that time, videogames were just another silly game. We certainly didn't want you to be spending 24/7 playing these games that we considered not productive in any way." If you're still looking for a gift for your own mom, Pop Cap is giving away a free copy of Bejeweled to anyone that signs up for their newsletter. Worked on my mom. Happy Mother's Day.

oldwindways writes "The BBC reports that leading climate researchers are concerned that the tone of speculation surrounding many reports (scientific as well as in the media) could be making it more difficult for legitimate science to make a case for the future. Is Hollywood to blame? Have we 'cried wolf' too many times with global warming? Or is this just a case of some researchers who are not ready to face the truth? Either way, it raises the interesting question of how greater public awareness of Global Warming might be affecting the course of research and vice versa. Not to mention what happens when public awareness is shaped by factors other than scientific findings. This is especially troubling during what some are calling the warmest US winter in years."

pease1 writes "Wired and others are reporting that for New Mexico, the fight for Pluto is not over. Seven months after the International Astronomical Union downgraded the distant heavenly body to a 'dwarf planet,' a state representative in New Mexico aims to give the snubbed world back some of its respect. State lawmakers will vote Tuesday on a bill that proposes that 'as Pluto passes overhead through New Mexico's excellent night skies, it be declared a planet.' The lawmaker who introduced the measure represents the county in which Clyde Tombaugh, Pluto's discoverer, was born. For many of us old timers, and those who had the honor of meeting Clyde, this just causes a belly laugh and is pure fun. Not to mention a bit of poking a stick in the eye."

"Our analysis identifies several parameters from the drive's
self monitoring facility (SMART) that correlate highly with
failures. Despite this high correlation, we conclude that models
based on SMART parameters alone are unlikely to be useful
for predicting individual drive failures. Surprisingly, we found
that temperature and activity levels were much less correlated
with drive failures than previously reported.""

cnet-declan writes "Anyone remember VeriChip, a company that came up with the idea of implanting chips in humans for tracking them? They've been behind ideas like RFID tagging immigrant and guest workers at the border, and they've persuaded a former Bush Health Secretary to get himself chipped. In this CNET News.com article, we offer an update on how successful the idea has been. It turns out that, according to IPO documents, 222 people have been implanted, with sales revenue of $100,000."

An anonymous reader writes "Microsoft will host a two-day security love-fest this Thursday and Friday at its Redmond campus. Among those scheduled to attend are reps from Symantec, Trend Micro and Websense, as well as folks from AOL, Cisco Systems, Microsoft, Sun Microsystems and Qwest. Government and law enforcement expected to attend include the FBI, Secret Service and US-CERT. Topics of discussion will include Microsoft's response to zero-day flaws, new styles of denial-of-service attacks, spam, phishing and weaknesses in protection technologies such as sandboxes and virtual keyboards on banking sites."

Dotnaught writes "In a story about Google's recent security lapse with its anti-phishing blacklist, InformationWeekreports some odd behavior from the Google Toolbar. "Entering two keywords related to Social Security numbers — call them 'x' and 'y' so as not to compound the problem — into the Google Toolbar will produce a keyword search suggestion in the form 'x y John Doe.' Selecting the suggested search terms and name, as might be expected, generates a search results page with the named person's Social Security number. A spokesperson for Google said the company's engineers didn't have an immediate explanation for the auto-generated suggestion, that it was probably an aberration and that the suggestion would likely be removed.""

anthemaniac (989824) writes "Geothermal energy is overlooked as a cost-effective and clean supply of energy and could be the source of 10 percent of our electricity needs by 2050, MIT researchers say. From the article: 'Unlike conventional power plants that burn coal, natural gas or oil, no fuel is required. And unlike solar power, a geothermal plant draws energy night and day.' Declining oil prices in the mid-80s slowed interest in geothermal, but it's time to take another look, the researchers say."